Healthcare has come of age. The industry has grown in double digits over the last decade, due to the over-growing population. The population curve has seen an upward trend when it comes to the geriatric population. This class is usually dependent on the working or philanthropic class for all their needs including healthcare.
Though healthcare has shown a significant growth, the providers haven't been able to do much to fill up for patient no-show. Missed medical appointments not only disrupt schedules, but also leave doctors and nurses with gaps during the workday. In addition to this, it also creates financial burden for the providers.
No-show appointments represent a major burden on health care systems and have a negative impact on patient care. For instance, patient no-shows can cause scheduling and operational difficulties for clinics leading to reduced productivity. No-shows can also reduce access to care, as well as interrupt continuity of care and effective disease management for patients. Although the level of economic impact differs according to the size and nature of the healthcare organization, the overall financial cost of no-shows is substantial.
According to a 2016 study published in Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute (MDPI), Basel by the journal Healthcare, it was estimated that the financial cost to the United Kingdom National Health Service (from nonattendance at outpatient clinics) was approximately 790 million Euros per year. Similarly, the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), one of the largest integrated healthcare delivery systems in the United States, estimates the cost of no-shows and unused appointments to be approximately $564 million annually. Likewise, a quality improvement project aimed to reduce the ‘no show’ rate in a Pediatric Neurology Clinic at Hamad General Hospital, Qatar conducted in 2016 highlights that 49 percent of patients referred to pediatric neurology did not show up for their appointments leading to long waiting times for new patients, and a waste of clinic resources. The same study underlines that the international bench-mark for primary care clinics is 5-10 percent, however for specialist healthcare centers, the no-show rate has been reported to be higher. This has created a dent in the pockets of the healthcare providers leading to wasted resources.
In addition, the nature of patients with respect to the use of technology has also to some extent hampered patient engagement and activation. As the providers' quest for population health management (PHM) focus finally shifts towards patient engagement, there has been growing interest from data/analytics firms, payers, telecom and device makers, and non-healthcare tech giants in bringing out user-friendly tools and apps. While this is being done, it's become challenging to understand where things are in terms of the adoption and impact of clinical patient engagement technology. Though telemedicine has been around for some time now, the use and spread has been very limited.